Crash
by Firefly840
Summary: It was only a glass of wine. It was only his wife. But now it's his grief.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own them. If I did, they wouldn't die. But lots of other good stuff would happen.**

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It was only one glass of wine. That was it. A night spent in a fancy restaurant, surrounded by uppity people. That and one glass of wine. It had felt good going down too. It made the dizzying pleasure that was looking at Kate even better. Smooth, slippery, light. Just a glass of wine. It was one he would never forget.

Not because it was special. Or expensive. He'd had plenty of those types of glasses of wine. He was a man who had tasted the spectrum, but none would change him like this one.

He offered to drive. She'd had three glasses of wine. She held her alcohol better than him, but he had only had one glass of wine. Far better than three. So she let him. Let him escort her around the vehicle, place a hand on her face, felt his soft, warm touch, then watched in rubbery pleasure as he had gone back around the car.

Sliding in, he had looked at her, the vehicle silently pulling out of the parking spot. Bliss so perfect, so quiet that neither wanted to break it. Not even the infamous Richard Castle and his rapier tongue. So they let it sit there.

A backstreet. They took a backstreet to get home, one that glowed in the moonlight, and lit up every perfect flower. No other cars would interrupt their night. Gliding around the curves in the small road, Castle held her hand in his.

He turned to smile at her, his face shifting slowly. But a moment, a single glance, it would ruin him. He slid his face around front, frozen in a still time, he realized he was in the wrong lane. The wrong lane. And that soft lit back road, the one with no other cars, it belonged to another set of lovers. But they were going in the opposite direction. And he was in their lane.

Bright lights illuminated his face, his eyes glowing from the high beams. She gasped, the sound crossing her lips so soft, so sweetly silent that for the rest of his life he would wonder if it was his imagination. Funny how such a small gesture would be the last from her.

With a sickening crunch, the slow motion that had been their night, came racing into full speed. The man, the driver, Richard Castle, would lurch forward, the airbag stopping him in his place. His hand fell away from hers as the vehicle was flung wildly to the side. Squeals greeted his ears as his hand desperately searched for hers.

And then, a soft lurch, the car came to a stop. It lay on the side of the back road, crunched. The front glass was broken and the driver side door was smashed open. Richard Castle pulled himself from the car, limping around the front of the mess, oblivious to anything else. He didn't notice the blood that dripped from his face, or the white mark on his hand from one last squeeze.

The only thing he saw, laying cold in the moonlight, was a pale hand, extended out of the ruined passenger side, and the empty hollow face that accompanied it, pulse deadened, eyes closed forever.

It was only a glass of wine.

It was only his wife.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: Still don't own Castle. But don't worry, I really wouldn't kill off the characters if I did.**

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He never knew how candle light could hurt. How it dug right into a person, and held on. Each flickering light outside of the house where he had shared a life with her was a reminder. It was a reminder of how she had always told him that candlelight was the best light. She couldn't do that anymore. Because she was gone. And the people outside were only reminding him.

And it was a hole left behind. A gap. Like the kind after losing a tooth and his tongue would rub the same spot, but it was just never the same. It felt wrong, different.

He didn't cry the whole way home. Not when Alexis picked him up. Not when the medics had dragged her body from the car, limp and pale. Not now, looking out the window at all the candles.

Stepping away from the window he went to the kitchen. It seemed empty without her laughter. He looked over to the couch where Alexis lay, asleep. She had held his hand, but he didn't really need her, she needed him. When she had finally drifted off he had pulled his hand from hers and went to think by himself. That was hours ago.

Down the hall. It was dark, but it still smelled like a woman. His woman.

Into the bathroom, it was dim, silent. With a soft click of the lighter on the counter he lit a candle. She always preferred to bathe by candle light. A book was on the counter. He picked it up, and put it back down. His hands weren't fit to touch anything she might have. He leaned back on the marble sink, his head lowering to touch his chest.

Putting his hand down, it brushed against a hairbrush. Her hairbrush. He picked it up, pulling a small brown hair out of the prongs.

Then, with a deep breath, he cried. Cried until tears came no more.

Because in that bathroom, the candlelight, the brush, it went straight to the hole. But they just couldn't fill it.

It was far too big.

He pulled his notepad from his pocket. It was crumpled, and there was a spot of blood on the corner. He slid the pen out after it.

Writing, it was what he did. It made him feel better. But now was no time for Nikki and Rook. Their antics. That was something of yesterday. It was gone. It wasn't coming back. No more precinct, no more crimes, no more of the brilliant woman, the one who drove him mad. Mad with happiness.

His pen touched the paper.

"She loved to catch criminals."

He wiped away his tears.

"She smelled like cherries."

He sat down on the toilet lid.

"Her eyes were green."

His pen went wild, scribbling down the page, line after line, sentence after sentence.

Hours later, that was where Alexis found him, frantically writing her down.

Writing her down before he forgot.

Because that would be the worst crime he could ever commit.


	3. Chapter 3

They sent him a pamphlet. The five stages of grief, who to turn to, where to get help. But there was only one help he needed, it was Kate. He wanted her to come, return. He wanted to look up from the window where he would wait, see her standing there. She'd roll her eyes, put one hand on her hips. He wished she were there.

She'd tease him about the crying. She'd tease him about the not sleeping. She'd tease him about being weak. She'd tease him for not writing. She'd tease him for bathing by candlelight.

But he wouldn't have minded. He would have given anything to have her back. His Kate, his wife, with her smile, her walk, her mind, her eyes. He would have done anything to not need those stupid pamphlets about the five stages, the five stupid stages of grief.

But as much as he hated it, he couldn't bring himself to not read them. So he picked them up in the early morning of a lonely sunday.

Stage One -

Denial. He still spoke to her, asked her opinion. When putting on a shirt - "the blue one today?" It was her favorite. He yelled at her each night to put away her hairbrush, but it stayed. He still made her a cup of coffee every day. Just let it sit on the counter. Alexis threw them out when he wasn't looking. Otherwise there would have been dozens of full mugs of coffee, lining, covering the kitchen surfaces.

In the mornings he reached over to her side of the bed, his hand soft, ready to brush against her cheek. But he always felt like crying when his hand missed her face and landed with a smack in the pit where her head should have been. It was always cold. It was always empty.

He brought her badge with him when he went anywhere. It fit in his coat pocket perfectly and his fingers rubbed it numbly all day. She would be mad if she knew that he was carrying an illegal badge.

But he didn't care. He would have done anything to feel her presence again.

Stage Two -

Anger. In the middle of the night, he would plod silently down to the kitchen, sit upon his stool and watch as the coffee dripped into the pot. He would look around and catch a glimpse of her face. With a start he would search for her, look for her face. But it was only the reflection of a photo. In a a well aimed swipe he would grab the coffee mug on the counter and hurl it into the shining glass.

As it shattered he would sink to his knees against the cupboards, oblivious to the blood trickling down his forehead, or the coffee overflowing on the counter.

Then, hours later, when the sun came up, he would stand, wipe the blood from his face and go back to bed.

It was mornings like those when he didn't see the point of getting up.

Stage Three -

Bargaining. He wrote stories. Not Nikki Heat, not Rook. But him. Him and his Kate. Stories where they would go out for a dinner. The car would slide to a stop again, the moment replaying. The crunch of metal against metal.

Sitting in his chair in the office in the middle of the day, rubbing the bump on his hand where her nail had pierced his skin. The only reminder of the accident he wrote about. The only physical proof that it actually happened.

Except in the stories, instead of him, instead of a man crossing in front of the car, reaching for the woman, calling her name, it was her. She would climb free, see him dead. She cried in the stories, cried pale tears from her emerald eyes.

But at least she was alive to cry them. She was alive and he was dead.

And he wrote those stories over and over. So many times that when he sat in his chair to write, he had memorized what to say. It was automatic. Because she should be alive.

And he shouldn't.

Stage Four -

Depression. He cried many times. Alexis came over every night and he would hold her hand, talk with her. They would watch a movie and she would drift off, every night. Just like the night Kate was first gone from him, he would pull his hand from hers and cross to the window.

Hours were spent there, staring out. But unlike the first night there were no candles. Not a single one. They pointed at the hole in his heart, but still he wished they would come back.

Not seeing them, it was like she was forgotten.

And forgotten meant that she was really truly gone. So each night, he waited, hoping that maybe one person would come, come and cause him a little more pain with one of their candles.

Stage Five -

Acceptance. It hadn't happened yet. He always quit reading the pamphlets at that part. He really didn't think that anybody could get to that stage. It didn't exist.

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So he continued to live, talking to her in the morning, throwing things at night, writing the stories, waiting at the window.

He lived in all four stages, hating that he did, because that meant that he was grieving, and that meant she was really, truly gone.

Gone so far that she couldn't come back. Not ever.


	4. Chapter 4

Time passed for others. But for him time seemed to stand still. He floated in longing and half realities.

And he still visited her grave.

Windy weekdays he would climb over the bluff at the graveyard, passing silent tombstones, nodding to their occupants, till he reached the fresh stone.

"Whoever fights, whoever falls,

Justice conquers evermore...

And he who battles on her side,

God, through he were ten times slain,

Crowns him victor glorified,

Victor over death and pain."

He would kneel in the fresh grass over her grave, letting the moisture seep through his pants. The flowers he brought would be placed under the headstone, ready to wilt near her.

Sometimes, he'd reach over and rub the stone, cleaning it, polishing it's light gray marble. Contentedly, he could sit there for hours, head bowed in front of her.

The grave keeper got used to it, seeing the kneeling man in the distance over the hills, a tiny pinpoint against the rising sun behind him. People visited, but not this often, and never for this long.

But he was only a watcher, he could not understand the pain of the man in the distance.

After a while, freezing cold, Richard Castle would reach into his back pocket, pull out his notepad. His icy white fingers would rub the blood stain, almost all faded for the amount of times he had touched it. Gingerly he would pull open the cover, flip past the plot ideas from months, days, hours past. When he got to the pages that were just a long list he would slow down. Take his time on each page, reading, rereading. Memories would play through his mind, like a film.

"She was the best shot."

_He looked over at her, the woman he had just met, holding her issue gun. She put her eyebrows up, staring at him, then turning back to the red target. With a loud boom, a bullet hit the center of a heart in the paper dummy at the end of her lane. He chuckled and she sighed. She hated him, but he would change that._

_And he couldn't help but notice that her eyes were green. They were green and they flashed with satisfaction every time she made that perfect shot. It was the first time she took his breath away._

_And she didn't even care that he existed._

"She became a cop for her mother."

_Her face was pallid in the soft afternoon light. She brushed back a strand of her short brown hair, barely meeting his eyes. He wanted to make a joke, like he would have for any other girl, but he couldn't. Instead he reached over and almost took her hand. But he caught himself before she saw._

_"She was murdered Castle. But promise me you won't go looking."_

_"I promise." It was the first agreement of friendship he had ever shared with her. The woman who was so different, so new, so driven. She drove him wild. He wanted to find her mother's killer, ease her pain._

_But he'd do anything for her and what she wanted was to be left alone, so he agreed._

_Even though it hurt like hell._

_"_She pretended not to care."

_He'd waited in the bathroom for hours. Waiting to hear the sharp click on the tile floor that would signal her entrance. Finally, after all that time, he'd heard the noise he'd been waiting for. __A thud as she slammed the stall door next to him. With a start he had popped up, peering over the wall between them._

_She jumped, pulling the book to her chest. His book. He'd caught her._

_Caught her, looking scared, shocked, beautifully angry on the toilet seat. Her emotions raging, her yelling at him to get out, anger issuing from her every being, but he didn't mind._

_He didn't mind because it proved his worst fears wrong, it proved that she really did care._

When he reached the last page, the reel done running, her face still fresh behind his closed eyes, he would rise. Slowly he'd walk back down the knoll, the wet spots on his knees, back to the waiting car.

His mother would look at him, grab his hand, squeeze it tight, tighter.

"I know it hurts."

He knew too, he'd known for a long time.


	5. Chapter 5

One year. One year today.

One year since wine.

One year since smiles.

One year since love.

One year since gentle touches.

One year since the crash.

One year since he had seen her.

It had been one year too long.

The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes, was the portrait of her on the wall. Her eyes were large, green, and laughing. Sun splayed across her features, illuminating the way she smiled, her face tilted, at ease.

It was taken at their wedding.

It hurt him to look at it. He closed his eyes, turning back into his pillow. It would be so easy, so easy to go back to sleep, spend another day by himself, lost in grief. He didn't want to get up. Why should he?

Through a tiny crack he looked back at her face. She stared right at him, through the camera, through the photo. Her laughter, her smile, it called to him.

"Get out of bed, lazy male." He almost cracked a smile. It was if her voice was in his ear again. Her quipping, her wit, he could feel it coming at him.

Slowly he sat up. Swallowing, his adam's apple bobbing, he starred her in the eyes. With a slow motion he dragged himself up, out of the bed.

He was standing, standing in the middle of his bedroom, tall and straight. Deliberately, he went to his closet and pulled out a nice shirt. Slipping it on, some pants too, he sprayed about his cologne.

He headed out through the living room, grabbing his keys from the closet. He hadn't driven in a year. But his keys were there waiting for him.

The parking garage was quiet. Honks echoed throughout the large empty space. The car, the one that she had died in was waiting for him. His mother drove it from time to time, but he never got behind the wheel. Not since that night.

Blinking back tears, he wouldn't cry, not now, he climbed in and started it. It purred to life, as if nothing had ever happened. As if it had forgotten.

He put his hand over to the passenger seat, rubbing the seat, rubbing the arm rest.

_A slight gasp, slipping between her lips, the tight squeeze of her hand. He was thrown forward, but he could see her body smash into the air bag. Frantically he looked down, feeling the slide of the car, not seeing over his air bag. But when he searched, looked for her hand, it was gone. There was only a slight trace of blood in the shape of her nail._

_The sliding stopped. Time held still. He heard nothing, saw nothing._

_He pulled his body free, walking around the vehicle in a state of shock. Numb, he looked down expecting to see her crying, but okay._

_But the pale limp hand was not. He threw himself down, into the glass and the metal crushed all around. He reached for her face, holding it between both hands. Her eyes were open, but she did not see him. He could feel the salt of his blood, sweat, and tears running down his face._

_He yanked, he would free her, she would be okay. But as she stared, stared blankly off, he knew it was no good. And as he sat there, in tears over the dead woman he held, trapped in the emaciated car, he heard the sirens roaring in the distance and the cries of the couple he had hit. But none of it reached his ears. Richard Castle was in a far away place, a place where he was holding the woman he loved, for the last time._

He shook his head. Memories slid away, too slippery to be held onto. He put the car in gear and pulled out of the parking space.

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When Martha Rodgers opened the door she saw her son standing there holding flowers. For the first time in a year, he was smiling, looking at her with hope in his eyes. He reached out and took her hand. Together they climbed down the steps and got into the car.

"I want you to come with me." She nodded, breathing deeply. He hadn't wanted her to come with him. Not ever.

But when the car pulled into the graveyard they both climbed out. She went around the car and took his hand. He looked at her, taking a deep breath.

With large strides the two of them crossed the windy bluffs, together, the sun lighting their silhouettes.

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Richard Castle strode in through the front door. He was different, a changed man. He stopped at the window briefly, admiring the city, but moving on into the kitchen. He grabbed a mug and poured himself some hot coffee.

Back down the dark hallway. But it no longer smelled like a woman.

Into the dark bathroom. He flipped on the light switch, not bothering with the candle or the dusty lighter.

He took a long, deep sip of his coffee and reached for the brush on the counter.

With one sweeping motion he opened the bathroom drawer and placed the red brush inside. One last touch and he closed the drawer.

He leaned his head down, taking a deep breath.

"Love you Kate."

He turned, flipping off the light switch. The bathroom was dark once again.


End file.
